McAdow, ashen-faced, leaned forward.
‘Nothing? Nothing?’
Cartwright shook his head.
McAdow, in white shirt with shining star and light gray pants with black leather holster, rose from his seat and went to the window. He shook his head.
‘Your idea, Tim. Your idea.’
Cartwright poured himself a half-tumbler of bourbon and downed it in two gulps. ‘Good. I confess. My idea. Sue me.’
‘Jesus, what did you get us into, Tim? What did you get us into?’
‘Will you relax? Just relax. The marshal says we’re in good shape.’
‘And he won’t answer your radio message.’
‘He said we should sit tight and we’re in good shape. Now damn it, until we hear from him or reach him, that’s what we’re going to do.’ Tim Cartwright filled the tumbler half-full again.
‘We’re in great shape. Great shape. Moskowitz is dead. Just like Bullingsworth got it. Farger is shitting in his pants because he says he met some guy who rips off car roofs, and we’re sitting tight with orders to do nothing until further orders. Great shape. There’s Farger out there carrying the ball, and he’s as loose as lamb-shit, and Moskowitz is dead.’
‘I trust Dworshansky.’
‘So why are you drinking so heavy?’
‘I’m celebrating early. My victory next week in my bid for re-election. Mayor Timothy Cartwright last night won an overwhelming victory in his re-election effort as he trounced one lunatic, 99 percent to 1 percent.’
‘You’re so sure? Just because Dworshansky said so? Your great friend, military, political, organizational genius Dworshansky. The man countries bid for. Your friend.’
‘You agreed,’ Cartwright said.
‘Everything happened so damned fast.’
‘Something else is damned fast,’ the mayor said. ‘You forgot damned fast that the feds were going to stick your ass in jail, and Dworshansky’s manoeuvre has blown that all to hell.’
‘I’d rather do a stretch in jail than end up with an ice pick in my ear.’
‘We don’t know if Dworshansky did it.’
‘And I don’t know that he didn’t.’
‘And if he did, so what? He told us, maybe some people had to die. I don’t like it. You don’t like it. But even worse, I don’t like being poor and in jail.’
Sheriff McAdow turned from the window. ‘I’ll see you. I’m going back to headquarters. The lines will be buzzing like crazy in this weather.’
‘Go to it, Clyde. That’s what you were elected for. Protect the people.’
When the sheriff had left, Tim Cartwright filled his tumbler full and turned out the lights in the room. He watched the hurricane grow, the rain coming in torrents now, the city preparing to survive nature.
What had gone wrong? He hadn’t run for office to be on the take. He had run because he wanted to be somebody. He had come home from the second world war with the government owing him an education under the GI bill and a lot of thoughts about democracy and that way of government being the best for people to live under.
So how did he end up with a big fat bank account in Switzerland, scheming to stay out of jail? Even as a councilman, he wouldn’t take. Sure, he needed campaign contributions and contractors who were helpful got a little extra consideration, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Was it the first time that the campaign treasury had a surplus, and he took the overage for himself? Or was it doing favours for nothing, and then wondering why he didn’t do them for something?
Tim Cartwright could not place the first step toward actively seeking extraordinary profit from his office, but he knew the later ones. And they could send him to jail.
And so, not to go to jail, he entrusted his future to a man who claimed he knew how espionage worked. It had seemed very simple at first. Well, not really simple, but kind of daring-brilliant.
The fed spies had Cartwright and McAdow and Moskowitz. They knew the bank accounts and the graft and the shakedowns. So instead of trying to deny it and defend themselves, they were told: go on the attack. Make it impossible for the government to use its information.
And it had worked. An expendable piece of equipment, Willard Farger, had been sent off on a fool’s errand—to attack the government - and it had worked, Cartwright was going to be re-elected next week, and the government would be afraid to move against him. And by the time the feds had gotten their wits back about them, well, Mayor Tim Cartwright might just have resigned his office and decided to go live out his twilight years in Switzerland.
‘I promise you a long and happy life, free of jail,’ Marshal Dworshansky had said.
And there was only a small price. Give him the city. Whatever the Marshal wanted in greater Miami Beach, Cartwright had to provide. Cartwright hoped that Dworshansky would ask for the narcotics business. Cartwright had never wanted to be in on it, but the money was just too much to refuse.
Protect the people. Tim Cartwright downed the last of the tumbler and wanted to cry. He would have given anything at that moment not to have taken that little bit of campaign overage many years before.
In Folcroft Sanatorium, a Dr. Harold Smith appeared bewildered. Did the FBI men really believe someone with a Folcroft educational grant was doing some sort of political espionage?
Yes, was the answer.
Well, Dr. Smith’s books and records were completely open to the FBI. Imagine someone doing something illegal with an educational grant. What was this world coming to?
‘You’re either naive or a genius,’ said an FBI agent.
‘Neither, I’m afraid,’ Dr. Smith said. ‘Just an administrator.’
‘Just one question. Why are those windows one-way glass?’
‘They were like that when the foundation purchased the estate,’ said Smith, who remembered how the dating on the billing had been changed more than a decade ago in preparation for just such an investigation. The whole organization had been set up to work just that way, from the computer tapes to the billing on the one-way glass.
The secret of CURE was holding. If it could hold just a little longer, Remo might be able to pull off the little miracle. Somehow, figure out a way to defuse the Miami Beach bomb that was blowing the cover off CURE. It was a slim chance, but it was CURE’s only chance. Just wait. Wait for an all-clear from Remo.
In Miami Beach, nothing was clear. Hurricane Megan had seen to that. Even Chiun had been helpless, as his daytime serials were interrupted by static. The Master of Sinanju looked heavenward in anger and then to Remo’s surprise, turned off the television.
‘I’ve never seen you do that before, and in the middle of As the Planet Revolves.’
‘One cannot go against the forces of the universe. That is for fools. One should use those forces and thus become stronger.’
‘How can you use a hurricane?’ asked Remo.
‘If you need to know, you will know, when you are at peace with those forces.’
‘Well, I need to know, Little Father, I need to know something.’
‘Then you will know it.’
‘I will know it. I will know it,’ said Remo, imitating the high-pitched voice. ‘What will I know?’ He went to a large oak table in the middle of the living room of the condominium apartment that he had leased in Chiun’s name, using the last of the CURE money he had.
‘What will I know?’ he repeated and closed his right hand on the corner of the table. ‘To focus the forces of my mind,’ he said, snapping off the corner of the table as if it were thin plastic. ‘Hooray for the forces of the mind. We now have a broken table and I am still helpless.
‘What will I know, Little Father? To keep the centrality of my balance?’ And Remo’s feet hit the wall, then went to the ceiling, as if yanked by wire cords, and then, back down to the carpet which he caught with his neck. He rolled erect to his feet. ‘Hooray for the forces of the mind. We now have footprints on the ceiling. Helpless. I’m as helpless as you are. We’re helpless. Don’t you understand. We’re just two crummy, helpless assassins.’